Byton enters the electric vehicle foray with stunning ‘Concept’

Byton, a Chinese start-up has revealed its upcoming all-electric SUV at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). The design is bold and futuristic, but its whats inside that takes the cake. The interior is designed with the tech-savvy in mind with loads of information on a gigantic 40 inch “Shared Experience Display” screen that spans the whole width of the dashboard. This allows both the driver and passenger to control and configure their own “zones.” The front seats can also swivel towards the center by 12 degrees to allow passengers a clear view of this massive screen as well. The drivers seat has a smaller 8 inch touch screen that sits in front of the steering wheel. Meanwhile, rear seat passengers also have their own seat mounted displays with cameras that offer facial recognition and gesture control functions. Passengers can use hand gestures to control the infotainment system, climate control, and media using hand gestures, but there will also be voice recognition too.

The Byton electric SUV will also use facial recognition sensors to create profiles for each driver. The driver can upload their facial data and preferences to a cloud database (that is if a driver feels like uploading personal data preferences to a cloud). This feature then is recognized every time you enter a Byton vehicle. The facial recognition feature can also be used to lock and unlock the vehicle using cameras mounted on the B-pillar.

Byton’s all-electric SUV will have a range of up to 250 miles (400km) for the rear-wheel drive model, while the all-wheel drive model will have a 325 mile range (520km). 71kWh battery packs power the rear-wheel drive model and a 95kWh battery pack powers the all-wheel drive model. Byton says both batteries packs will support fast charging to 80% within 35 minutes. This electric SUV will be fast with an equivalent of 272HP in the standard version and a more powerful version will put out 476HP! Level 3 autonomous driving systems will be available at launch in 2019, but Level 4 autonomous driving systems will come next decade.

Byton is currently building a factory in Nanjing, China to start manufacturing the company’s electric cars. They hope to build 100,000 vehicles annually. This “concept” all-electric SUV is set to arrive in 2019, give or take. Pricing will start at $45,000 USD for the base model.

There are plans other models in the future such as an all-electric sedan and a compact car, all of which will be built on the same modular architecture.